This manual covers key measures to be taken by various agencies in handling situations when leopards venture into human dense areas. It provides practical information to handle leopard situations when they enter cities, towns, villages, when leopards fall into dry or wells with water, or when they are found caught in snares.

The manual also provides information on the equipment that's required to be kept by the forest department and other agencies in areas where there are repeated instances of leopards entering human dense areas. It provides information on Karnataka government procedures in providing ex-gratia, documenting leopard presence in an area, and outreach activities that could be undertaken in high interface areas.

This manual is also available in Kannada.

Journal Article

2016

Factors affecting provisioning times of two stork species in lowland Nepal

The ecology of stork colonies in south Asia are
very poorly understood. Factors affecting provisioning times by adults were
evaluated at nests of two stork species, the Asian Openbill (Anastomus oscitans) and the Lesser
Adjutant (Leptoptilos javanicus), in lowland
Nepal where the landscape is dominated by multi-cropped agriculture fields. Analyses
focused on understanding if provisioning times are influenced more due to colony-level
variables, wetlands around colonies, or season. Using generalized additive
mixed models and the information-theoretic approach, colony-level variables (brood
size and chick age) showed non-trivial associations with provisioning times (substantially
better than the null model). Univariate models with colony size and wetlands had
poor support (worse than the null model). Season, which represented the
changing cropping patterns, rainfall, and wetness on the landscape, was the most
important variable for both species. The combination of season and wetlands was
very important for provisioning Asian Openbills whose chicks fledged during the
monsoon (July–October), but not for Lesser Adjutants whose chicks fledged in
the drier winter months (November–February). Results strongly suggest that
changing cropping patterns to a drier monsoonal crop, or reductions in wetland
extents, will be detrimental to storks in Nepal.

Riverine species are adapted to natural habitat changes caused by seasonal flood-pulses. However, abrupt river channel changes following flooding events intersect with social systems of land and water management (e.g. agriculture, fisheries) and in turn generate significant consequences for conservation of endangered aquatic species. We investigated tradeoffs between changing river habitat availability and exposure to fishing intensity for a small population of Ganges River dolphins Platanista gangetica gangeticain the Karnali basin of Nepal. A major natural flooding event in the Karnali basin in 2010 caused the river channel to shift from the Geruwa (flows through a protected area where fishing is restricted) to the Karnali channel (high fishing activity, agriculture-dominated), where dolphins moved in response. Based on our survey data (2009–2015) and long-term hydrological trends in the basin, we found that irrigation diversions since 2012 had aggravated fishing impacts on dolphins, suggesting that their new habitat had become an ‘ecological trap’. Regression models showed that at low river depths, fishing intensity negatively affected dolphin abundance, but at higher depths no effect of fishing was observed. Two records of dolphin bycatch in gillnets confirmed this, as both events corresponded with periods of sudden increase in water abstraction for irrigation. Overall, dolphin distribution shifted downstream and the population declined from 11 in 2012 to 6 in 2015. Effective protection of this river dolphin population from extinction will require the Government of Nepal to prioritize ecologically adequate river flow regimes for implementing efficient irrigation schemes and adaptive fisheries regulations in the Karnali basin.

Book

2016

Birds of Spiti and Ladakh: A pocket guide to 137 birds of high altitudes